Categories: Food & Wine

Sabra Liqueur

Sabra has been around for a very long time, and rightly so. Both for those who are crazy about chocolate (like myself) and those who can take chocolate or leave it (like my husband) – it is a wonderful after dinner drink that has just the right combination of sweet and kick.

For those who love chocolate, that taste is absolutely central to this drink. For those who are indifferent to chocolate (heavens knows why), the orange overtones mellow out the chocolate and give it a sort of “bite” and making it far more refreshing to drink straight than a plain chocolate liqueur. The product is also slightly thick – like most liqueurs – so if you want to splash a little bit of it on your plain vanilla ice cream... YUM!

But to give you a better idea of the taste, let me try to describe it as you might experience it. When you open the unusually shaped bottle you will be greeted by three scents – the sharp kick of alcohol, then a spicy orange tang followed by an undertone of the sweet chocolate. This pleasant mixture of different scents seems to meld together. This pours out a deep, dark caramel colored liquid with a golden glow to it, which is particularly pretty and warming looking.

When you take your first sip you’ll feel the alcohol immediately on the tip of your tongue. As the liqueur flows through your mouth you’ll taste first the bright, clean and refreshing taste of the orange part of this drink, which will almost make your mouth feel like you’ve taken a sip of a sharply flavored orange fizzy drink. I say sharply since there will be little to no sweetness in the taste, as yet. It will only be as this goes down your throat that you’ll get the aftertaste of the sweet, slightly nutty chocolate flavor coming through, which has an almost milky undertone. The chocolate also has a slightly nutty highlight to its taste, which is fairly soft – more akin to almonds than hazelnuts. This will leave your mouth with the unusual combination of feeling refreshed and yet softly sweetened, with the alcohol and more of the orange zest feeling coming through up into your nasal passages. As these fade, the main taste will remain quite chocolaty leaving a slightly thick film on your tongue, but because of the tangy orange, you won’t get any sickly sweet feeling with this. Quite a lovely experience, if you ask me.

This product can usually be found in any good liqueur store or off license. The pretty bottles contain 750ml of the liqueur, and the smaller, hip flask shaped bottle contains 250ml. I always make sure I have a bottle of this in my home – but not just for drinking. I find this an essential component to my chocolate cakes, adding it with, or instead of vanilla to give my confections a “twist. It can also be used in making chocolate sauces for topping cake, and as I said above – splashed on ice cream. For the adventurous, try making a “Sabra & Cream” drink, for a completely different cocktail. Of course, you might want to substitute this in any cocktail that calls for either chocolate or orange liqueur – just to see how it comes out.

In sum, I love this liqueur, and would recommend it highly to anyone looking for a new after dinner treat, or addition to, or on top of their favorite deserts. Five stars out of five (but of course, how could I give it any less?)!